The Tall T (1957)

Information from IMDb

Plot Summary
Having lost his horse in a bet, Pat Brennan hitches a ride with a stagecoach carrying newlyweds,
Willard and Doretta Mims.
At the next station the coach and its passengers fall into the hands of a trio of outlaws
headed by a man named Usher.
When Usher learns that Doretta is the daughter of a rich copper-mine owner,
he decides to hold her for ransom.
Tension builds over the next 24 hours as Usher awaits a response to his demands
and as a romantic attachment grows between Brennan and Doretta.
Written by dinky-4 of Minneapolis

Full Cast
Randolph Scott ... Pat Brennan
Richard Boone ... Frank Usher
Maureen O'Sullivan ... Doretta Mims
Arthur Hunnicutt ... Ed Rintoon
Skip Homeier ... Billy Jack
Henry Silva ... Chink
John Hubbard ... Willard Mims
Robert Burton ... Tenvoorde:
Robert Anderson ... Jace (uncredited)
Dick Johnstone ... Townsman (uncredited)
Ann Kunde ... Townswoman (uncredited)
Christopher Olsen ... Jeff (uncredited)
Fred Sherman ... Hank Parker (uncredited)

Writing Credits
Burt Kennedy (screenplay)
Elmore Leonard (story)

Original Music
Heinz Roemheld

Cinematography
Charles Lawton Jr.

Trivia
Columbia Pictures released this film on a double bill with Hellcats of the Navy starring Ronald Reagan and Nancy Davis.

During filming it was called "The Captives" (Elmore Leonard's original story title) and/or "The Tall Rider". Just prior to release, the title was changed to "The Tall T," the name of the Tenvoorde ranch in the early scenes.

The line screenwriter Burt Kennedy wrote for Scott, "Some things a man can't ride around," was repeated in a later Scott/Brown production, "Ride Lonesome." two years

Goofs
Anachronisms
As Brennan rides into town, after the meeting with the station keeper and his son, he passes the stage, which is standing in the street. Behind the stage, in the street behind, there is a parked car.

In the hideout is a fireplace with a highway torch burning in it. Commonly known as smudge pots, these round oil burners warned drivers of caution ahead. Patented in 1927 and commonly seen on roadways in the 1950s, this one somehow did a time warp back to the 1880's.

Memorable Quotes

Filming Location
Alabama Hills, Lone Pine, California, USA

Watch the Movie

The Tall T

The Tall T is a 1957 American Western film directed by Budd Boetticher
and starring Randolph Scott, Richard Boone, and Maureen O'Sullivan.
Adapted by Burt Kennedy from the short story "The Captives" by Elmore Leonard,
the film is about an independent former ranch foreman who is kidnapped along with an heiress,
who is being held for ransom by three ruthless outlaws.

In 2000, The Tall T was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry
by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

User Review

Quote

Classic of its kind.
28 October 2004 | by Robert J. Maxwell ([email protected]) (Deming, New Mexico, USA)

SPOILERS.

If you're attracted only to black-and-white dramas shot in the rain in Slovenia, you probably won't like this one.

It's a no-nonsense El Cheapo Western shot on a low budget, an elementary piece of exposition of masculine honor, with Boetticher, Scott, Kennedy, Richard Boone, and movie flats -- all at the top of their forms.

What distinguishes the half-dozen or so Westerns that came from Boetticher and Scott is not so much the plot, which is generally simple, but the slight twists in character and the occasional grace notes in the dialogue.

You have to love this dialogue. "Cookin'? That's WIMMIN's work!" And, said by Scott in all sincerity, "There are some things a man can't ride around." And, "There are ten head of wimmin for every man in Sonora. Course, most of them is just hurrah gals." And, "I'm not gonna get shot in the belly just 'cause you're feelin' sorry for yourself." And, "Why don't you just say it out in words?"

Basically the story has Scott and O'Sullivan (who, twenty years earlier had been Tarzan's delectable mate) held hostage by Boone and his two shallow young companions, Billy Jack (Skip Homeier) and Chink (Henry Silva). Boone, although a vicious murderer, is not entirely unsympathetic. He feels forced to "run with" these coarse companeros who live from moment to moment. They don't even know their own ages. They've been beaten and mistreated since they were kids. ("You run with them," says Scott reprovingly.) Boone, on the other hand, is sick of their talk about wimmin and such. He is lonely, has no family or wummin waiting for him. "Talk," he orders Scott at gunpoint, "about anything!" He dreams of someday having a spread of his own, with a couple of cattle, working the ground.

But the code -- I mean the movie code of the 1950s, not the Western code -- is an unforgiving one. He is, after all, a murderer. When O'Sullivan's cowardly new husband is given permission to ride off to freedom and desert his wife, Boone turns away and mutters, "Bust him, Chink." The coward's name is Willard Mimms -- Arthur Honeycutt draws out the vowel and imposes a dipthong on it when he pronounces the name -- "Mee-yums." We know Mimms is toast five seconds after we meet him.

Richard Boone is great as the heavy with the daydreams. In a particularly violent climax he is blinded by a shotgun, twirls around entangled in a burlap sheet, and collapses. Scott shows his range in this movie. He laughs at the beginning and becomes grim after being taken hostage. He even forcefully smothers O'Sullivan in passionate kisses. And I thought he only like horses and mules. Commanding too is the performance of Henry Silva, in pink shirt and suspenders. He's clever, the way a sewer rat is clever. He slouches when he walks, and he stands hipshot. His expression hardly ever varies. And his voice is matter of fact, even when he's eagerly anticipating dumping yet another body in the well.

It's quite a lot of fun, shot as it is in Movie Flats. That's Mount Whitney in the background, the highest peak in California's Sierra Nevada. The highest peak in the lower 48 for that matter.

Display More